


The Devil You Know

by StrawberryLane



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: 5+1 Things, Adoption, Canonical Child Abuse, Credence Barebone Deserves Better, Credence Barebone Learning Magic, Credence Barebone Lives, Families of Choice, Gen, M/M, Past Child Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-06
Updated: 2017-01-06
Packaged: 2018-09-15 06:41:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9223493
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StrawberryLane/pseuds/StrawberryLane
Summary: Five times Credence expects punishment and one time he doesn't.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I've fallen in love with Ezra Miller's face. Can you really blame me, though?

**1**

Punishment is something Credence is intimately familiar with. You could even say that punishment is what he knows best in this world – a whole world better than he knows kindness and love.

And being the obscurial, the thing that is horrible even in a world of witches and wizards, is surely worthy of punishment above and beyond anything he's ever experienced before.

The cell MACUSA has provided for him is small, white and bare, but at the same time so much better than his own tiny room back at the church ever was. For a start, this one's not drafty (because there are no windows, but still), and he gets to have this one all to himself. So what if it's guarded to prevent him from leaving? It's not like he has the spirit, the energy to do so anyway. But waiting for punishment is making him nervous. With ma you could always be sure you would be punished for something, even if you didn't know what it was. Here, they just stuck him in this cell and, it seems, forgot about him. Credence can't decide what is better. Actually getting the punishment he's dreading, or spending the rest of his sorry life between these four walls, long dismissed and forgotten about.

He's lost count of how many days and nights he's spent on his bed, trying to ignore the boredom that's gnawing away at his bones, when the door to his cell swings open. An official looking man appears in the doorway, wand drawn.

"Come on now, Mr Barebone," he says in a gruff voice, and Credence has no other choice than to follow the man, out of his tiny little cell. Credence misses the bare room the minute he steps out of it. Now it comes, the punishment he's been waiting for, he's sure of it.

He thinks he might die. He's not sure that would be a bad thing, entirely.

The man takes him to a grand office, and Credence let's out an involuntary gasp of breath the minute he steps through the door. Mr Graves is sitting behind the desk, flanked by Miss Goldstein and the regal woman Credence suspects must be some kind of queen.

"Here we are then," the regal woman says, keeping a hand on Mr Graves shoulder. "The only thing needed now is Mr Barebone's signature."

"S-Signature?" Credence stutters a little. They are all looking expectantly at him. Do they mean he has to sign his own death warrant?

"Yes, Credence. As you're technically an adult, we need your signature to be able to formally begin the adoption process," Miss Goldstein tells him, smiling in a way Credence has never before had anyone smile at him like. It fills him with hope.

Miss Goldstein wants to adopt him.

  


**2**.

After months of living with the Goldstein sisters, Miss Tina and Miss Queenie, Credence is a changed man. At least outwardly. His hair is longer, no longer forced into a bowl cut by ma, who had no patience for vanity, his skin is no longer deathly pale all the time, instead glowing more and more healthily each day. He's getting stronger and taller, no longer hunching into himself. Ma had never seen kindly on the fact that her only son towered over her, even when he was hunching to make himself smaller.

Queenie and Tina on the other hand, has no patience for his hunching, though they try to keep it to themselves. They haven't punished him for a thing he's done since he came to live with them and for that Credence is forever grateful.

But still, years of learned behavior sticks with you.

The thing is, Credence hunches over, into himself, without thinking about it. It's not difficult to appear shorter than Miss Tina, because she's about his height anyway, but Miss Queenie is another matter. The woman is still taller than his mother was though. And she wears heels, something his ma never did.

"Your body is going to get stuck like that if you don't straighten up," Miss Queenie tells him one day whilst they're walking down the street. Credence is carrying packages from all sorts of different shops. Most of it is for him, which is a thing that has never happened before. All of these packages for him and him alone? Miss Queenie even bought him a wand. Unbelievable.

At Miss Queenie's words Credence tries to straighten up. She doesn't like that he's hunched over, so the solution seems simple enough. Except only a few minutes later he's back into his hunched state, his head almost level with his shoulders. He feels, more than sees, Miss Queenie slip behind him on the sidewalk and a minute later he feels her hands, one on his back, between his shoulder blades and one on his right shoulder.

Here comes punishment for not listening, he thinks.

She presses her hands against his body, gently forcing his shoulders into an upright position and Credence steels himself for the blow to the back of the head he's sure he's going to get.

But nothing happens. Miss Queenie simply removes her hands from his body and falls into step with him again, smiling a smile that tells Credence she's not really happy at all, but trying to hide it.

  


**3.**

Credence has begun working in Mr Kowalski's ("Call me Jacob, kid. Mr Kowalski's my old man, nobody else,") bakery on the weekends. He's helping out in the back, carrying sacks of flour and scrubbing the bowls and other things used to actually make the bread and pastries. Mr Kolwalski – Jacob – is a kind man. Logically Credence knows this, knows the man doesn't have a violent bone in his body.

But the man has been a soldier, and being a soldier changes you, Credence thinks. So he tries his best not to cause any trouble and stay out of everybody's way.

Except one day, when he trips on something whilst carrying a bag of flour from one end of the bakery to the other. The bag is big and he has to carry it with both arms and it obstructs his sight of what's in front of him. So he can't avoid the thing on the floor, only being able to give a shout of surprise as he, and the bag of flour, falls to the floor in a heap. By the way there's white dust on his clothes, he, with trepidation, realizes that the bag ripped when he fell.

Oh, this can't be good.

Before Credence has had the time to gather himself enough to decide what to do next, a pair of work boots steps into his vision. Credence looks up, face flushing when he meets the gaze of Mr Kowalski.

Being punished by Mr Kowalski looks like it would hurt. Ma always used something other than her own hands – Credence's belt, a wooden spoon from the kitchen – but Mr Kowalski probably won't need to. He's strong and could probably do a great deal of damage to Credence with his fists alone.

"You all right, Credence?" Mr Kowalski asks and, instead of kicking Credence when he's already laying down, the man offers his hand, helping Credence into a standing position. Instead of raising his fist or anything like that though, Mr Kowalski just looks at Credence, taking in the sight of his dusty clothes.

"We need to get you an apron. Should've thought about that earlier, shouldn't I?" Mr Kowalski turns around, walking towards the other room in the back of the bakery. "Come one, I'll show you where the broom is."

When Credence doesn't follow him, the man stops and turns back around. "I won't punish you for tripping, kid. Could happen to anyone, it's nothing to worry about."

  


**4.**

During the weekdays, when he's not working at Mr Kowalski's bakery, Credence studies magic under the watchful eyes of Mr Scamander. They spend most of their time inside of Mr Scamander's suitcase, which is a thing Credence still haven't gotten over. A whole world inside a suitcase, his mind has trouble taking it in, even after all he's learned since ma's death.

Mr Scamander is a patient teacher, if somewhat preoccupied with his animals at times. But Credence can't blame the man; he's clearly the happiest when he's around his beasts.

Studying magic is hard work, but Credence does his best. After all, it's probably his best bet at getting actual control over the beast inside himself. He can control it, sure, but what if he gets angry and doesn't want to? There's a reason MACUSA granted his adoption to the Goldstein sisters, one of whom is an auror and the other who knows what he's thinking all the time, and not just anybody.

Credence is, much to his own surprise, excelling at this whole magic thing. He practices spells Mr Scamander teaches him under his breath, learns how to flick and switch his wand. There's one spell he's only read about though, that Mr Scamander has yet to actually teach him, so one day when the man is busy feeding his beasts and Credence is sitting alone on the steps of the hut, he figures trying it out can't hurt. He grips his wand and mumbles "Aguamenti." It works, and soon there's a jet of water from the tip of the wand. Credence grips the wand tighter, because even if he knows how to cast spells now, he's still overwhelmed when it actually works.

Only problem is, he might have overdone it. The stream of water has yet to stop.

"Stop it," he tells the wand, but nothing happens. A trail of water, like a very very small river, is forming at his feet, making it's way into the open spaces of Mr Scamander's suitcase.

Credence is going to have to ask Mr Scamander for help. He gets up from where he's sitting on the steps to the hut, following the trail of water. He holds his wand close to his side, pointed downwards, so at least his clothes won't get soaked.

Mr Scamander is in the process of feeding the niffler when Credence finds him. Credence stays quiet for a moment, embarrassed that he has to ask the man for help.

"What can I do for you, Credence?"

"I... I might have tried a spell... And now I can't get it to stop," Credence rushes through his words, trying to get them out as quickly as possible. He holds up his wand, showing Mr Scamander the water that is still steadily streaming from it.

"Oh," Mr Scamander says. Credence watches as the man grips his own wand, waving it towards Credence. Credence braces himself, just in case, but nothing happens. Well, something happens, but nothing horrible and painful. The water from his wand stops, just as if he'd turned off a tap.

"You're not mad?" he dares ask when Mr Scamander returns to his work as if nothing has happened.

"No. Things like that happens when you're learning. When I was a child I once, as an experiment, made all of the furniture in my room stick to the ceiling. My parents had to help me get it down, because I didn't know how to. No harm done."

  


**5.**

Credence regularly has lunch with Mr Graves (and sometimes Tina). It's awkward at first, because the man Credence thought was Mr Graves wasn't Mr Graves at all, but an imposter. The real Mr Graves was imprisoned in a closet for months, and Credence didn't notice until the very end. Even now, he can't help but think of the imposter as the real Mr Graves, even though he knows that the real Mr Graves would never refer to him as a squib and tell him he was useless.

But it's difficult to forget that a man wearing Mr Graves' face has actually hit him before, even if Credence does his best.

So when he accidentally spills his drink over Mr Graves lap (they're sitting next to each other inside a booth at a family owned magic diner, instead of across from each other, as is customary, don't ask) he does his best to remember that this is the real Mr Graves, the one who promised to show him magic and not the one who thought he was useless.

But instead of slapping him, or narrowing his eyes in a way that promised a world of hurt once they got home like ma would have, Mr Graves actually, honest to God, laughs and grabs his wand. For a horrible moment Credence is sure Mr Graves is going to hex him, but instead the man only points his wand towards his water soaked lap, drying out his clothes.

"It's only water, Credence, and I'm a wizard," Mr Graves says gently when he sees the look of dread on Credence's face. "I promise, you've got nothing to fear from me, sweetheart."

Credence doesn't know why he's blushing; whether it's because he misunderstood the situation, or the term of endearment. Either way, he promises himself not to think of it while in the presence of Queenie.

 

**\+ 1**

Credence is confidently striding along the streets of New York. Modesty, now that he finally found her, in a rundown no-maj orphanage run by nuns, is running to keep up. She's not used to Credence walking with steps these long.

"You can't just barge into there with me. Credence!" she pants, trying to sound like she doesn't need to catch her breath. Credence, of course, notices and slows down, a blush on his cheeks.

"Sorry. I promise you, though. It won't be a problem."

They have had this conversation again and again over the last half and hour, always with the same result. Credence insisting it will be fine, that they won't care. Modesty, on the other hand, figures they might do. Credence, more or less moving his younger sister into his adoptive family's home, that is.

Modesty might not have been as much of a subject as Credence to Ma's anger, but she still got her fair share. She's got her reservations.

Just barging into the Goldstein sisters' home and expecting to be welcomed to stay is a thing she's a bit wary of.

Credence is confident it will work, though.

Once they reach the building, Modesty grabs Credence's hand, holding on for all her worth. He leads her up the stairs, quietly opening the door to the apartment.

Modesty hasn't even put a foot through the doorway before she's enveloped in a hug; she and Credence both.

"Welcome home, sweetheart," chirps the younger of the Goldstein sisters in her ear. "We're so glad you want to join our family."

 

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you liked it!


End file.
